


something tragic, something magic (something lonesome, something wholesome)

by muse_apollo



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, M/M, POV John, POV Second Person, Slice of Life, Sort Of, The Romance Is Ambiguous, the major death is john
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:33:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22259533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muse_apollo/pseuds/muse_apollo
Summary: When Merle Met John, John also met Merle.a retelling of the events in the parlay room from John's perspective.
Relationships: Merle Highchurch & The Hunger | John, Merle Highchurch/The Hunger | John
Comments: 9
Kudos: 56





	something tragic, something magic (something lonesome, something wholesome)

**Author's Note:**

> first fic for the fandom.... so there's that. 
> 
> this one's a little experimental, but I hope you like it.

The first time you meet him, you’re surprised. It’s kind of funny actually, it’s been so long since you haven’t known something. Surprise feels new to you. Confusion feels worse for its impossibility. 

The room you’re in is both familiar and unfamiliar simultaneously. It reminds you of the place you came from, the place you once thought was your home. Now you don’t need a home, you are, in some ways, your own home, and in that same way you are home to thousands of others. Home is not a concept you’ve bothered to consider in a long time. Home is nothing, in the grand scheme of things. 

The appearance of the man across from you is near comical. A stout dwarven man; there’s dirt caked on his skin, and flowers woven through his beard -his very  _ pink _ beard-, and oddly enough, he’s not wearing a shirt. 

You try to speak, but you can’t, not at first. It’s been too long. It’s no effort to summon a drink for yourself -how long has it been since you drank anything?-. It’s reassuring to know you have power in this place, wherever it may be. 

His name is Merle (Highchurch, Merle Highchurch, he says). He asks you your name in return. It takes a moment for you to realize you don’t remember. You lie to him, you tell him you don’t trust him. It’s not wholly a lie. It’s true that you don’t trust him. Its somewhat embarrassing not to know your name anymore, but you haven’t needed it in millennia.

It’s strange to talk to someone, that much you notice, even in your nervous state. Too many feelings you forgot interrupting the logic of your thoughts. It’s been so long since you’ve had to hold a conversation, you transcended the trivial requirements of verbal communication so long ago. 

It startles you the most when he makes you laugh.

He expects you to know him, since you’ve apparently been chasing him so long. He doesn’t understand his own insignificance. He says you’ve killed him before. You’ve killed a lot of people.

You kill him again for good measure. 

*****

You don’t expect to see him again. You apologize. Killing him feels a little rude in retrospect. Knowing he comes back is strange. You want to know how it works. 

You agree to his game, a quid pro quo of sorts, and this time, you do tell him your name.

It took you weeks after your last encounter to remember it. It was buried at the back of your mind, you had to probe deep into your memories, but when you found it, it fell once more to the front of your mind. You wondered how you could ever have forgotten. 

It’s nice to say it aloud. More than that, it’s nice to be called that again. Merle’s voice is pleasant, you’re glad of that. It’s the first voice you’ve heard in many years, and may well be the only one you’ll ever hear again, so it’s nice it’s a voice you can enjoy. 

You kill him again at the end of this conversation, and as the parlay room fades around you, you begin to consider your questions for next time. Should you not have destroyed him by then. 

*****

You’re ready for him next time, you’ve chosen your question carefully, tactically. You want to know what he calls you, of course you do, but you only get one question, you can’t waste it on meaningless curiosity, not with what’s at stake. 

He seems hesitant, but he does tell you what his ship looks like. That’s the game, of course, he has to tell you. It will help you to stop him, you think. Or rather, to stop him stopping you. 

*****

Another year passes, and you find yourself looking forwards to these chats. It’s a pity he’s such an inconvenience really. Not an enemy exactly, he and his friends are far too small for that. Anyway, you like him, you shouldn’t, but you do. 

Once more you ask what he calls you, and once more he does not answer. Once more you take his life. He will be back next year, you think. He always comes back. 

*****

The years pass smoothly, and some time along the way your conversations slip from tactical to amicable. If Merle notices, he doesn’t say anything. Neither do you. 

You introduce chess around year ten. It’s a good way to pass the time, and it’s something you used to enjoy before all of this. The calculated strategy which underlies the game is comfortable. 

You’re close to year fifty when your curiosity finally gets the better of you. You need to know what he calls you. You need to know what you are. 

The Hunger. You smile. You kind of like it. It doesn’t quite define you, but then again, you don’t think anything could. 

His question for you makes something shatter in your chest.

_ Are you my friend? _

It’s instinctive when you reach out, flame forming in your palm to end this once more. You have to stop yourself. That’s not the game. He’ll only be back next year to ask again. 

Some quiet part of your mind whispers that if you don’t play the game he won’t come back at all. You want him to come back, that much you know. 

You tell him the truth. Friendship is below you. Love and happiness are fleeting, fragile things. You are a rock in the face of eternity, you’re very existence is in defiance against a maker which chose cruelty as a way to restrict you. You cannot have friends because you do not  _ need _ them anymore. Because you know what truly matters and it isn’t anything so frivolous as that. 

It’s the truth, but something about it rings hollow to you.

You ask one more question, you know the game is over, but you need the answer. You need to understand this man who exists so in opposition to everything you’ve come to believe.

“What brings you joy, Merle?”

His answer sounds ridiculous, in the face of what you know, and yet… somewhere deep within you something stirs. It’s something you haven’t felt in a long time, something you’d forgotten could be felt.

You haven’t felt joy in so long. You know far too much for that. You figured it out, once you explain it, he will understand. 

You tell him what you learned, it’s suddenly so important to you that he understand. You need to teach him, to enlighten him. You gave the speech that changed the world, the speech that turned them to you. He will understand the horror of it all, he will come to embrace the world you’ve built.

But he doesn’t. Once more he surprises you, he has infinite capacity for that. He disagrees. No one’s ever disagreed. He shakes his head, and chooses to sever your arrangement, leaves you with words that ring a clear end to just over twenty years of whatever this has been. 

“Kiss my ass, you sanctimonious bastard!” 

His words ring clear across the room, and for the first time in what feels like eternity, you feel sad. 

You burn him away, and this time you know you will not see him again.

*****

It’s years before you see him again, twenty-seven to be exact. Years before you find the light. Years in which you come to understand the meaning of hunger. You’re desire for the light is insatiable and yet, it is nowhere to be found.

When you do find him again, you’ve had time to think. You’ve seen things differently now, come to understand the way he sees the world. Still it doesn’t matter. You’re falling apart, cracking at the seams.

You’re so hungry.

You’re glad to see him again when you do, even now, even as you’re tearing at the seams, it’s good to see him.

He’s different now. He’s aged, he’d never aged before. Different, but still Merle, the same dirty, sunbrowned man, sleeves rolled up and flowers in his beard. Only, there was less of him now, an arm and an eye both gone, and a certain tiredness about him, like you never used to see. 

He makes a quip about your own appearance, it’s not surprising, given what’s happened to you these past years. 

You don’t know how he hid the light, neither does he it seems. He’s charming, even in his poorly crafted lies. He’s always been charming. Seeing him puts that warmth in your chest again, that thing you’d forgotten how to feel. 

You’re afraid to talk to him, but he needs to know. You need to warn him. Concern is new for you, and yet it makes sense for him. You feel concern for Merle.

He tells you about his kids, and you laugh. It’s good to hear, it’s good to know his life has improved since he escaped you. You’re eager to hear more, even as you try to convey your message to him through your game.

You need to get your message across, you’re running out of time. They can see you, their thousands of eyes poking through the walls, watching, waiting. They’ll grab you if they realize, they’ll pull you from him, and that will be the end of this. If they take you from him now, you fear for his fate more than your own. If they take you from him now, you’ll never see him again.

You’re frantic now, desperate. He needs to know. He needs to understand. And then he does, but at the same time a Merle comes to understand, so does the Hunger.

Hands grab at you, he tries to pull you back, desperate. You clutch at him, his arms wrap around you and for once, you remember what it is to be held. 

And then you’re gone

*****

The rest is colour and darkness and noise. Flashes of pain and violence and rage, something you can’t make out or understand. The rest is hunger.

*****

When you come back to yourself, you can’t help but summon him to that space one more time, you know there’s not much time left, what’s left of you is residual. Soon there will be nothing left of you in this world. In any world. 

You choose a beach because he loves the beach. You take your jacket off and roll your slacks and you wait for him. It’s strange to see him, as he sits beside you in the sand, staring out at the setting of the sun. For more than twenty years, you met, brief conversations, exchanges of information, fleeting smiles, games of chess. For more than twenty years, you looked forwards to seeing him, laughed like you hadn’t known you could. For twenty-seven years you felt his absence like an ache in your chest you didn’t know you could feel.

And now you see him. He sits down beside you, and he smiles, and his eyes are war and mirthful, and you wonder how it took you this long to realize. Friendship, joy, and love, of course these things mattered to you, they had for longer than you’d been willing to admit to yourself. 

You wish it hadn’t taken you so long to know, but you loved Merle, of course you did. Merle was what brought you joy. You can’t tell him, can’t make the words come out, but he seems to understand regardless. He places his hand on yours, the one that’s still his, and together you watch as the sun slowly sinks below the horizon. 

And then you’re gone.


End file.
